


grand tour

by Elizabeth Culmer (edenfalling)



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: Afterlife, Aslan's Country, Fifteen Minute Fic, Friendship, Gen, Home, Male-Female Friendship, Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-05
Updated: 2013-06-05
Packaged: 2018-02-09 12:10:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1982484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/edenfalling/pseuds/Elizabeth%20Culmer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three weeks after Peter closed the stable door, Eustace turned to Jill and said, "Let's go home."</p>
            </blockquote>





	grand tour

**Author's Note:**

> This ficlet was inspired by the 11/5/12 word #254 on the [15_minute_fic](http://15_minute_fic.livejournal.com) Livejournal community. If it feels unfinished, that's because it sort of _is_ \-- this ought to be the opening scene of a longer story, but I find the concept of Aslan's Country somewhere between implausible and boring, so I never got around to continuing it. Someday I will write Jill and Eustace in a proper story in a proper world having a proper adventure. (Possibly even with giant and witches and dragons, oh my!) But not today.

Time meant little in Aslan's country, so far as Jill could tell -- unless she wanted it to, in which case she was suddenly aware of every passing second and its positions in the endless, dizzying expanse of eternity. She felt that sort of knowledge ought to crush her mind, but just as this land was larger inside than out, so she herself seemed to have grown, and might indeed never reach the limits of her soul any more than she could find a boundary to this world at the heart of all worlds.

And so she knew it was precisely three weeks, two days, eight hours, one minute, and twenty-five seconds after Peter closed the stable door when Eustace turned to her and said, "Let's go home."

"Aren't we already?" Jill asked, but she knew what he meant. Narnia was lovely, but it had never been their own country, not like it was for Eustace's cousins. For her it was more a special holiday destination than anywhere she could imagine living for years on end.

Eustace gave her a sour look. "Don't be obtuse, Pole."

Jill offered him a peppermint by way of truce. Eustace made it vanish into his pocket and dusted his hands.

"I don't know if I want to find our old houses," he said, "but at least we'll be messing about in familiar country."

"Or unfamiliar," Jill said. "There must be trains and aeroplanes. And I've always wanted to see the world. What do you say? Shall we take the long way round?"

Eustace wavered for a timeless, frozen moment. Then he shrugged and said, "I suppose I'm due an adventure that doesn't involve giants, witches, or dragons. It's not like England will vanish if we take our time. But no caves and no wooden ships. I've had enough of those."

He held out his hand. "Shake on it?"

Jill took his hand with a smile. "No caves, no wooden ships. And when we're done exploring, we'll go home."


End file.
